


Blood Money

by GE Morrow (gpmorrow)



Category: Nero Wolfe - Rex Stout, Wonder Woman (Comics)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-18
Updated: 2020-02-18
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:13:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22791550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gpmorrow/pseuds/GE%20Morrow
Summary: Diana, Princess of Themyscira, walks into the brownstone on 35th street with a case for Wolfe.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 15





	Blood Money

I was in the office, typing up an invoice for the Ajax case, the kind of affair that kept the household in orchids and gourmet food. It was a few minutes short of eleven, when my boss would take the elevator down from the roof garden where he invariably spent four hours every weekday, when the doorbell rang. Fritz was at Rustermann’s, mediating an argument over a variation of remoulade that one of the sous-chefs wanted to try, so door duty was mine. I checked the view through the one-way glass panel, having learned a valuable lesson in a previous incident about relying on visitors having ordinary levels of politeness.

I have not opened the door more willingly in my life. On the stoop was a woman who stood a good five inches taller than me in her short boot heels, and whose hair, a gorgeous tangle of black curls, added another inch or two to the total. She was wearing tight brown woolen slacks tucked into the boots and a cowl-necked sweater in a tan cashmere that couldn’t have been much softer than a cloud. She said “Archie Goodwin?”

I opened my mouth and said what was probably the most eloquent thing that could be said in the circumstances. That is, I opened my mouth and nothing came out. She smiled, and I knew that I had not distinguished myself from the majority of men who had met her for the first time. 

Somehow, I was able to remember that I was standing in front of one of the top two or three most physically powerful beings on the planet, and I said “I’m not sure how to address you. Is it ‘your highness’, or…”

“My title is really of any relevance only on Themiscyra, Mr. Goodwin. In Man’s World, I usually use ‘Diana Prince’.”

“Very well, Ms. Prince. Come in. What can I do for you?” After she passed me into the entry hall, I took a look up and down the street outside before closing the door. I don’t know if I was looking for centaurs or supervillains or the luckiest news photographer on the island, but the street was apparently empty.

“I would like to speak to Mr. Wolfe regarding a case.” 

“We’ll take it.” Just then, the elevator behind us started up. “That is, that’s Mr. Wolfe descending to the office. If you would step into the front room, I will tell him that you are here.” She graciously accepted my invitation; if she had done a single thing without grace in her life, I could not imagine it.

I hustled into the office through the adjoining door and was seated at my desk when Nero Wolfe walked in, placed today’s orchid spray in the vase, and settled his seventh of a ton in the specially-made chair behind his desk. Turning to face him, I said “We have a potential client in the front room.” 

“I was aware of no appointments today.”

“No, sir, she did not have an appointment. But I thought it was worth your attention.”

“She? I have no interest in indulging your besotted fancy. Send her away.”

“I assure you, you will be interested.” Wolfe once held forth at a dinner with a botany professor from the University of California that humans communicated as much as 75% of their meaning through tone of voice, expression, and posture instead of words, and I was attempting to project complete sincerity in all three channels. Which was not difficult; if Wolfe did in fact order me to send her away, I would almost certainly have to go with her, and probably found an order of monks dedicated to her.

Wolfe simply looked at me, then made a short growl and said “Very well, show her in.”

I went to the door to the front office, opened it, and carefully kept my eyes on Wolfe as I introduced our guest as “Ms. Diana Prince, Princess of Themyscira. Wonder Woman.”

Wolfe did not disappoint: His eyes widened, and he actually placed his hands on the arms of the chair as if to stand, a gesture of respect very few prospective clients get.

I showed Ms. Prince to the red leather chair. She did not offer to shake hands with Wolfe; if she could recognize me on sight, it was no stretch to assume that she was familiar with my employer’s quirks. After offering refreshments and being graciously — you will see that word a lot in this report — turned down, I returned to my desk.

“Good morning, Ms. Prince,” he said. “I am awed by your presence, and I trust you will forgive any lapses in politeness or the ability to engage in speech while you are here.

“But I find it difficult to believe that you are here with a case for me. Are you not colleagues with the so-called ‘World’s Greatest Detective’?”

“This is a New York case, and he prefers to operate in Gotham City. Also there are certain personal matters that make me reluctant to ask him for a favor. Whereas you, I know, are perfectly willing to be bought.”

As much as a quarter of a smile crossed Wolfe’s face. “Perhaps so,” he said. “But neither Mr. Goodwin nor I, despite or as evidenced by the appearance of our physiques, are capable of jumping tall buildings in a single bound. We would not be capable of pursuing a case along the usual lines of your work.”

“None of that will be necessary,” she said, “Or if it is, you may rely on me to take it at that point. This is a simple embezzlement case, Mr. Wolfe.”

“We have handled a variety of embezzlement cases. In the bulk of them, the malfeasor is obvious as soon as the fact of the embezzlement is known and the books are examined. If that is all, then we can certainly recommend you a competent forensic accountant to smoke out your embezzler.”

“This concerns my charity. Our finance director recognized the problem, but has been unable to make any progress towards identifying the source of the leak. Your reputation for results and discretion means that I want you and Archie to handle it.”

Wolfe was going to be insufferably smug for months on this conversation alone. I wouldn’t mind. She’d called me “Archie” and I was liable to float away at any moment.

Wolfe nodded. “Your lasso’s inestimable reputation for truth confirmed the director’s irreproachability? His inability to identify the thief implies—”

She interrupted. “Her, and yes”. Wolfe continued without a stumble; bolstered by compliments and a chance to take on a case denied to the only detective with a more expensive and quixotic hobby than his own, his ego ensured that his performance would be perfect.

“Indeed,” he said. “Why not simply line up your employees for an expedited review under the both literal and metaphorical noose? ‘Did you embezzle’, seriatim.”

“The lasso of truth is not to be used so indiscriminately. I could; but that would be intrusive on the innocent and disrespectful to the lasso itself. Once you have identified the subject, I can use the lasso to confirm it, but that is all.”

“One final objection,” he said, and I was prepared to resign immediately if he found a way to turn her down. “Why not Dol Bonner, or another woman detective, given your mission and my reputation for misogyny?”

“False modesty angers the gods as much as does hubris, Mr. Wolfe. For all Ms. Bonner’s talents – and we’ve used her agency before – she is Idomeneus to your Agamemnon.” 

His eyebrow quirked. I looked it up, later, after Wolfe spelled it for me; unsurprisingly, a woman out of Greek mythology knew her Greek poets.

“I am not often accused of false modesty; hubris, yes. I confess, I hoped my efforts to eschew the employment would be vain, and I am gratified by your confidence. Obviously, I am honored to take the case.

"As for payment," he said. He shifted his bulk in the only chair he really likes, and leaned forward in the slight manner that I recognized as the sure sign that he was about to go for the throat. Visions of Amazonian treasure danced through my head, enough to keep the bank balance fat for years. "I require one thing, and one thing only: A healthy specimen of _Ophrys themyscirae hippolytae_."

That fat anthophile was going to soak the living princess of an entire mythical Greek island for a single flower. I somehow let the disgust through my careful focus, for Diana shot me a fast wink before responding. “My mother’s flowers? She’s refused requests from botanical gardens in London and Singapore, unwilling to trust conditions off the island.”

“Nonetheless, that is my fee. My own efforts in the area are not modest, and my horticulturalist, Theodore Horstmann, is the equal of anyone in the field, so in my hubris I would dare to say we would be up to the duty of care. I would expect the flower to come with native soil, and to have the opportunity to obtain additional native soil when repotting becomes necessary.”

“I will speak to Mother. As to the case itself, there are five officers of the 501(c)(3) other than myself with disbursement authority on this scale. Financial Director Hasmig Lange has already been cleared in the manner you surmised. The others are Executor Director Daraja Chao, Marketing Director Sroy Cosgrave, Development Director Biyu Lombard, and Program Director Jasy Flores Hamasaki.”

“How far back does the embezzlement go, and when did each of these women assume their positions?”

“Perhaps four months. Daraja has been with me since shortly after I arrived in Man’s World, while the others have been in their current positions for various times. Jasy Flores has been in her position for the shortest period, only six months, but came up through the organization; I’ve known her for at least two years.”

“How is the embezzlement accomplished?”

“Payment of non-existent invoices, entered in our system and paid without record of authorization. And however they’re doing it, they’ve been able to do it even when we’re looking for it – in the three weeks since we found that there was a problem, two more invoices have been paid. So far the losses have been manageable, but at the current rate, we’ll have to start dipping into the endowment to make up the shortfall in operating funds.”

Dropping into the familiar routine of background questions helped us getting over who we were interviewing. Every time I looked up from my notebook, I still got what was undoubtedly a stupid grin on my face, but I was able to return to my notebook. Over the next hour and a half, we filled fifteen pages on the personnel of the organization, its operations, and the specifics of the crimes.

As lunch approached, Wolfe began wrapping it up. Wonder Woman would have had to use her lasso to get him to alter his schedule. Whether food or orchids, I’ve never been able to decide which was more immutable. I’d seen him sit on a narrow wooden chair to exhibit his orchids in order to shame a rival; I’d seen him travel hundreds of miles on a moving vehicle in order to attend a meal with great chefs. In this case, Fritz was making duck foie gras au torchon, using duck liver specially imported from a Swiss farm at a rate that would ding the bank account more than a single Amazonian orchid would stuff it, so maybe the answer is in there somewhere.

Wolfe invited Diana, of course, but she begged off, citing another engagement. We agreed that I would meet her at the office later to interview her staff myself.

After I saw her out the front door, waiting a moment to see if she would fly away or evaporate like a mist or something else equally implausible, although she just stepped down to the sidewalk and began talking on some sort of personal communicator, I met Wolfe walking across to the dining room. I asked, “Any instructions concerning the interviews?”

“I have nothing to work with. Your instruction is to bring me something.”

“Guided by my intelligence and experience.”

“Yes, and your innate charm.” On any other occasion, he would have taken the opportunity to chide me about descending into a den of women, warning me not to become so dazzled as to lose track of the objective. Not on this occasion; he and I both were inspired by our client and would have no trouble maintaining focus. Plus, he had a unique orchid on the line, as if Diana wasn’t motivation enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The naming scheme for the principles in WW's charity was inspired by H. Beam Piper's work, which deliberately mixed personal names and family names from different ethnic groups as shorthand for how the future mixed the different cultures of humanity on Earth into one.


End file.
